The Monster's Muse
by HecateA
Summary: Is the bad guy always bad? Aren't we all the bad guy to somebody else? Oneshot.


**This idea came to me a while back while I was reading White Fang. Character spoilers for HoO. Odd point of view, and weird story in itself. Enjoy!**

**Disclaimer: me no own HoO. **

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The Monster's Muse

_He was a killer. His only food was meat._

His stomach growled, each step feeling like twenty, each paw he put weight on felt as frail as reeds_, _every thought being obscured by the hunger that tore apart his body.

_Live meat._

The wind brought more chills to his exposed body, but it also brought hope. A smell –no, not even, this tiny parcel of odor was even smaller- was brought up from an ambiguous location, possibly heaven, possibly death, to his nose. It warmed him, and gave him courage and a fighting chance. All he had to do was find its origin like a tracker and fight for the thing that would guarantee him the main thought, the main thing, the main importance. Food.

_That ran away from him swiftly,_

The forests of Virginia were mazelike and navigating them was a migraine, but for him it was a matter of instinct. Skipping over rocks, tree roots, keeping his balance on slopes and uneven grounds, weaving through trees as if the forest were a loom and he was the shuttle, not letting his paws sink into the moss too long- he could do it all. But so could the prey.

Suddenly without a moment of warning or the lightest foreshadowing, she disappeared. Even if he knew that she hadn't ducked behind a tree, or leapt into a creek or climbed a tree, but that she had indeed cleverly vanished like only her kind of blood did, and even if the rich and intoxicating odour that promised a full stomach was fading, he spun around himself to look for her, for the one that got away.

_or flew into the air,_

The demigod pushed the branches out of his way, but _he _could plough through. He'd waited long enough for food; trees would not be a barrier. He snapped his jaw to try and capture the fabric hanging off the prey, but came short. Short, short, always short…

The boy seemed to lead him to an open cliff. Thinking the prey would jump off and crush itself, he kept running, knowing that he could survive the fall and enjoy his meal. But at the last second the demigod of royal blood and warrior's lineage leapt off the cliff and, as if held at the waist by a cord his beastly vision couldn't pick up, the boy was brought higher in the air, closer to the sky, and further from him.

_or climbed trees,_

He had her. After chasing and chasing and planning it so that her pack of women-beasts would be split from her, he was going to sink his fangs into a princess' flesh and have the taste of powerful, noble, and uniquely blessed blood fill his mouth and drizzle down his snout… the feeling was praiseful of his troubles, the meat taming to his rebelling and shrunken stomach. Occasionally she would turn around and shoot a stick with a shiny bit at one end at him, but he was a moving target, a challenging hit to even her.

Then, out of a void of unexpected, she bounced and grabbed onto the long members of a tree. He panicked and sped up, but she was nimble and at ease, as if she'd been born and raised amongst one's branches. By the time he was at her tree, he couldn't even reach her while standing on his back paws and snapping his jaw like a snare. She was nestled between two branches, meeting his eyes with hers. When she realised that her position was one of safety and distance, she relaxed in the branches, sighed and closed her eyes.

She'd kept her lead, and her lead had given her life and he hunger.

_or hid in the ground,_

No trees, no cliffs, no tools and mundane objects twisted and amplified by magic and blessings; this would be it. She was his blessing. She was food. The glorious priority.

The girl in his black-and-white vision was darker than most and smaller. Any meat he could salvage off of her bones was meat, and meat wasn't something to turn down under any circumstance thrown at you.

But she was water in cupped hands. Close enough to hold and feel, but she slipped away fast. Through a tiny crack in the ground, she saved herself. He pawed at the ground and tried to dig her up, but the earth itself protected her and her wild, luminous eyes.

_or faced him and fought with him_

Pushing the rest of his companions before him, one of the preys stopped and stared, with the sharp blade in hand. The one that took away lives, that was. But he smelled the boy and he smelled his friends- but the boy's odour was stronger. Promising and smoothing, attractive and dangerous. A succulent meal. He could smell the sweet nectary perfume of one, the smoky and burnt and warm smell, the smell of blood and of the metal of weapons, and the smell of rot getting away -one scent for each of this one's friends- getting away. The salty smell would fill his empty and pleading stomach twice over though, making the pain and agony of twisting organs stop and freeze and die.

The boy raised his silly scrap and ran at him, swinging his shining stick through the forest air filled with the smell of meat, good, and a chance to buy an extra day for his starving pups, and make them prosper and live well.

That was the last he remembered.

_The law was: EAT OR BE EATEN._

_-White Fang by Jack London, page 82_

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_He was a killer. His only food was meat. Live meat. That ran away from him swiftly, or flew into the air,_ _or climbed trees, or hid in the ground, or faced him and fought with him_

-_White Fang by Jack London, page 83_


End file.
